As he started browsing the page a little further, he discovered various startling facts about the species. While one piece of information mentioned rhinoceros being extinct in some part of Africa, another described various inhuman ways in which a rhino is killed for its horns.

Typically, a rhino is trapped into a pit in which, when it falls, only its horn is visible. This gives the hunters a chance to cut the horn off the animal, leaving it not just struggling for breath in the pit but also bleeding to death. Bhide also learnt that the Indian rhinoceros, which is also called the greater one-horned rhinoceros, has witnessed a decline in its habitat and hence, is found only in a few parts of the country, primarily in Assam and a few sites in Northern India. Shaken by the information, Bhide decided to portray his concern in his medium of expression – theatre.

Bhide is all set to stage a Marathi play named NoRhino that talks about various aspects that have contributed to decrease in the count of rhinoceros and showcases how the animal’s life is under threat. “From trading to poaching and from poisoning to government apathy, the animal is losing its numbers due to greed of the human being. There are places in the world, where rhinos are killed for all the body parts and not just the horns. If this greed will not stop somewhere, we will be putting a full stop to the rhino count, and at some point it is bound to go extinct in India as well. Therefore, I wrote this play and named it NoRhino,” said Bhide, who has been running a theatre group named Dhyaas since 2008.

The play, shared Bhide, begins with the human beings romanticising their life and only busy talking about various problems, which, in reality, have been created by themselves. The play has both verbal and non-verbal content and thus, also resorts to various disturbing but real images of rhino killing and poaching for the audience. There’s also a sequence in the play when a man, who is frustrated with life, becomes a part of a pack of rhinos, saying that by being with them, he will at least add to their count. “I want NoRhino to become a catalyst or a thread for people to at least begin thinking about not just rhino but also various other animals and birds species, who are slowly getting extinct because of human beings,” said the artiste. This long-act play will be staged on August 6 at SudarshanRangmanch, 7.30 pm.

In the past too, Bhide has staged plays that touched upon issues that have been crying for attention. While his play The Last Colour, which also travelled to Turkey, talked about tiger’s decreasing population, his another work, Mi, PaanianiSavalya deals with the importance of water in man’s life. He also has to his credit plays like The Transparent Trap, which showcases the hazards of plastic and how it is gradually destroying the ecosystem and EkRikamiBaju that narrates the story of a breast cancer patient.